The poet Munk recalls his past with Haizi and Nishikawa
In the mid-to-late 80s of the 20th century, I was familiar with only four poets from Peking University, and they were Xichuan, Haizi, Zang Di and Luo Yihe. Of the four, only Xichuan and Zang Di are still alive and still writing. And Haizi and Luo Yihe, as we all know, one committed suicide in the Shanhaiguan area, and the other died of a heart attack.
I can't remember the last time I met Nishikawa. I have read that Nishikawa wrote an article about the cause of Haizi's death, in which it was mentioned that shortly before Haizi's death, some poets severely criticized and denied his poems. This hit Haizi so hard that it was one of the reasons for Haizi's suicide. I can't remember if Nishikawa was there that day. The meeting was in my house, and there were a lot of people. If I remember correctly, there were a lot of people who were discussing Hai Zi's poems, Yang Lian, Tang Xiaodu, Hai Zi and a dozen other people, who were running the poetry magazine "Survivor" together at that time. "Survivor" organizes a weekly discussion of the works, each time in a different person's home, talking about the recent poems of a different poet. That time it happened to be Haizi's turn, and I happened to choose to be in my humble house.
Haizi didn't make a deep impression on me at first, I just thought he was thin and slightly timid. Of course, he finally committed suicide to prove that he was not even afraid of death, which I did not expect.
The person who talked the most that day was Duoduo. He's such a man, he can talk eloquently. Otherwise, I wouldn't have been able to remember who else was there that time, and my memory was all blocked by Lao Duoduo's face.
In fact, no one has denied Hai Zi's poems, and everyone recognizes that Hai Zi is very talented in writing poetry. Duoduo's fierce rhetoric is only aimed at the shortcomings of Haizi's long poems, and we all feel that what he says is unacceptable. It's all too normal for poets to argue with each other over poetry. Of course you can just go and write yours and let him say his. I thought Haizi didn't care about this, because he barely said a word that day.
I can't remember Nishikawa coming that day. I remember one time when he got very drunk at my house. No one who knows him well knows that Xichuan is not a good drinker, and he doesn't drink at every party. That time was an exception, I don't know what happened to him, he drank three glasses of Erguotou in a row (he said he remembered three beers), and the result was the same, he lay on the floor of my house with his hair all over his head, and slept all night.
In the 90s of the 20th century, Nishikawa's poetry became more and more famous, and he published several poetry collections, all of which were given to me. His poems appear mature and wise from the same step, which is enough to prove that his later poetry names and influences are by no means in vain. He had read a large number of books and was very knowledgeable. He has a great talent for language, as you can tell when you look at his poems. But he always left me with the impression of being so peaceful and humble. He is very different from Duoduo, they are completely two people with different personalities and different temperaments.
Two years ago, I went to Baiyangdian with Xichuan and others, and it was to shoot a film about us. He was accompanied by Klay from the Netherlands and two Dutch film personalities. In Baiyangdian, he was moved by the pride and hospitality of the villagers there, and he made an exception again and drank a few glasses of wine. But this time he didn't get drunk, but didn't sleep all night. He was full of emotion and emotionally explained many of his concepts and truths. I realized that Nishikawa was actually a very individual person. He was also very eloquent and eloquent.